The Coming Uncivil War: The Fire This Timeby Richard Oxmanwww.dissidentvoice.org
March 8, 2004

"Why not annihilation? Their glory has fled, their spirit broken, their
manhood effaced; better that they should die than live the miserable
wretches that they are.

-- L. Frank Baum, later to
become author of The Wizard of Oz, writing as editor of South
Dakota's Aberdeen Saturday Pioneer, encouraging the extermination
of each and every Native American, December 20, 1891.

Garland's
"Somewhere Over the Rainbow" had just ended. I was lounging
around, sipping my slave-picked Earl Grey from Sri Lanka, and pouring
over my May 11, 1911 original edition of Le Petit Journal when
the postman rang twice. A typical Tuesday afternoon, although it could
have been Wednesday this week. Unreal.

I'll tell
you what was in the parcel post piece shortly, a bombshell of sorts for
America. First, the obligatory parsing of pain.

The
publication's ink drawing portraying violent audience members at the opera
house of Livermore, Kentucky -- spotlighting a quavering figure on stage
in the foreground -- is unforgettable. There, yoked to a pole, his upper
torso strapped tight, with rope drawn across the ankles forcing his lower
body to bend at the knees, the black figure in profile seemed to angle to
the right, a twist, wanting to get away from the drawn rifles and
handguns, much like a dog -- too afraid to move -- knowing that the
Master is about to do something painful. Perhaps more like a fish
caught with a troll, in frozen anguish. His clothes are in tatters, in
stark contrast with a clenched fist behind the back which is shooting out,
stretching in the opposite direction of his protruding lip. Millay's
"clutching at the South, screaming at the North" comes to mind, the
contortion commanding all. And speaking of shooting, the public execution
at Kentucky's cultural center only cost the usual prices for admission.
However, those holding orchestra tickets were allowed six shots whereas
balcony tickets were limited to one. For real.

Like Stamp
Paid, the mid-19th century black man in Toni Morrison's Beloved,
does when he notices a bit of bloody scalp, I want to scream out "Whatare these people? You tell me, Jesus. What are
they?" Of course, they were white settlers. Demonic, not insane, to
use Terrence Des Pres' yardstick. (1) Genocidal by all
the standards Raphael Lemkin established following Nuremberg.

The Jewish
Holocaust was not an abominably unique event, unless one is going
to acknowledge the same for a million Armenians, Stalin's fourteen million
"terror-faminized," et. al. in Bangladesh, Burundi,
the Brazilian Amazon, Kampuchea, East Timor and elsewhere*(often with our
invaluable assistance). (2) Respecting Africans and
Native Americans, the only way Americans can make conscious-soothing
distinctions -- allowing them to "do lunch," shedding tears over asparagus
at an Oprah-based Book-of-the-Month tête-à-tête, in lieu of taking any
significant action -- is to adopt the typical Eurocentric bias that
indiscriminately groups dark-skinned and red-skinned people into only two
undifferentiated masses; do that with white-skinned people and one can
totally exterminate the Polish population without owning to genocide.

*There was
a "total extermination of many American Indian peoples and the
near-extermination of others, in numbers that eventually totaled close to
100 million." (3)

It's all
horror that still goes on today, unabated here since the European
foot first stomped on this hallowed ground. But you'd never know it to
watch the parade of obese Americans, driving their SOVs (Standard Obese
Vehicles) going about their dailys. Not waiting on them anymore to become
compassionate, it looks like the guys who mailed me the package have a
Plan B. As promised, I'll get to that below.

At a
mid-90s conference sponsored by the Global Alliance for Preserving the
History of World War II in Asia (AOHWA) in Cupertino, California I saw the
most horrific photographs I had ever seen up to that point. They were
photographs, poster-sized, of the Rape of Nanking. Relative to writings
about the Jewish Holocaust, very little has been made available to us
concerning atrocities perpetrated in China, Korea, the Philippines,
Singapore and Indonesia. The Japanese military was responsible for
approximately 50 million deaths, 30 million alone in China. It begs the
question, "Why?".

From
December 13, 1937 to February 1938, in the single city of Nanking, the
International Military Tribunal of the Far East (IMTFE) estimates that
260,000 were killed. The Memorial Hall of the Victims of the Nanking
Massacre in Nanjing claims that the number was over 300,000. Some
Japanese put the figure as low as 3,000, its leading historian of the war
guessing that it was no higher than 42,000. (4) Live
burial competed with burning and freezing and the slowest and most
excruciating forms of killing ever known. Children were a special
delight.

A long
time ago. None of it has much to do with us now, right? We're not
killing minorities in cruel ways any longer, yes? We have our figures
straight these days, no? Our scruples in a row, like so many ducks,
vraiment? All I can say is "Quack, Quack!!" to the good doctors (Ph.Ds,
Ed.Ds et. al.) who have diagnosed Our Day that way.

I believe
former UN relief chiefs, Hans Von Sponeck and Denis Halliday --with
decades of devotion to UN efforts behind them-- would not agree. As I
remember, they quit their UN posts at very crucial times over the cruel
sanctions that were being imposed on the Iraqis. Over the bombings,
too, that had been going on for at least ten years; there was that
incredible 18-month study that John Pilger cited not too long ago in
TheMirror, wherein something like 36,000 sorties were flown
over the Iraqi no-fly zones, 26,000 of them combat runs (when there was no
war!) (5), all in violation of international
law. And that didn't account for the British bombs or the Turkish
air-campaign atrocities inflicted on the Kurds, the American and British
flyboys conveniently looking the other way.

In our own
country, as Jeffrey St. Clair points out -- lamenting the federal
government's abandonment of efforts to prevent pesticide-caused cancer --
"Corporate and governmental statisticians will broker the 'acceptable'
number of people permitted to contract cancer from pesticides residues,
comforted in the knowledge that most of these people will be poor and
black or Hispanic." (6)

I cite the
particulars above -- when there are an endless number to choose from --
because, for the most part, they're the ones that were alluded to in the
little package I opened on Wednesday, March 3rd. The one that informed me
--anonymously-- that something was in the works, and motivated me to do
something about it all.

"There is a physical
difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever
forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political
equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they remain together
there must be the position of superior and inferior, andI as much
as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to
the white race."

As much as
any other man? What man? He's not talking about Frederick
Douglas here. Nor you, I presume. Certainly, he's not speaking for me.
And I know those fellows who mailed their missive to me have quite a
different attitude.

However,
one can't say the same for Tommie Jefferson ("the blacks...are inferior to
the whites") or Benny Franklin ("Why increase the sons of Africa....?");
and they were the so-called "soft-liners" who were nowhere near as
maniacal as the likes of Andrew Jackson, a leader far more representative
of our past. Of course, there's the shining example set by John Quincy
Adams who "gave lip service" to the Indians and others. (7)
What a crew. What a foundation. Quelle dommage!

The point
is is that the country is rotten to the core respecting the issues touched
upon above, and the stench is starting to motivate
compassionate/infuriated minorities, and their sympathetic brothers and
sisters of different stripes, to take trenchant (unprecedented in
America) measures. Take note, if you will, a house divided will not
stand.

One has to
get notions of rebellious rag-tag youth gathering at the gates of the
Capitol Building (putting heads on the chopping block) out of one's mind.
It's not going to happen that way. Mau-Mau in Kenya is more the model*.
Mobilization by MoveOn will not be the order of the day. And to make hay,
the midnight killers -- for that's what they will be if our present
momentum is not reversed -- will not require huge groups, consensus or any
form of politically-correct sanction. They will be Invisible
Revolutionaries more along the lines of the Algerian Resistance. But
unlike the Algerians and Vietnamese, they will not demand the cover of the
general population. For they will not be fighting -- in the most immediate
sense -- for the people, nor in unison, but, rather, out of rage, and out
of unrequited love for what's right. They will be frustrated warriors who
-- in the face of stultifying surveillance and overwhelming
weaponry -- simply can't sit by and take it anymore. Without any Grand
Plan that all the academics and most "officially-approved"
leftists demand of those who would force change. Arundhati Roy and Pilger, of
course, are exceptions, but where are the prominent U.S. examples?

* Minus
the secret society meetings, the mountains of retreat being replaced by
myriad buildings, "habitats for humanity" in the minds of many.
No Kenyatta to capture, the individual insurgents will proliferate on
their own like cancer cells.

It's a
real shame 'cause it wouldn't take much for a Bush or a Kerry or a Nader
or SOMEONE to simply step forward regularly, acknowledge the horrors we
continue to perpetrate...and remind the populace that there's not much
else that's more important than changing the course of history in this
respect. To show that they are doing this and that...daily...to
make it so, to make things right. A little bit of Emily
Dickinson's "thing with feathers," not token gestures.

That, or
I'm afraid it'll be a thousand points of burning lights, illuminating
everything from gas stations and office edifices to private residences,
ski lodges and wherever it is that golfers congregate. Perhaps fire
won't be necessary in the clubhouses.

Thomas C.
Mountain of the Hawaii Black History Committee,
in an article that appeared in Counterpunch, February 27, 2004, asked,
"How are we ever
going to come to grips with racism in this country if we continue to deny
people of color their historical place? How could white people hate people
of color if they were taught Jesus would pass for black if he were to
rejoin us today?" He noted that Buddha, Jesus, Krishna, Mohammed and
Moses were all people of color.

Indeed.
Again, what would it take for a president at a podium to preach what's
begging to be expressed? To talk constructively about what's been wrong,
in real language. Not much. Little for anyone. But nothing like that is
heard, periodic pontifications on places like Haiti --during crises only--
notwithstanding. On the other (bloody) hand, it wouldn't take much for
the senders of my package and their underground compatriots to set off
bonfires in continental coordination, sort of flambes for freedom, if you
will. Bonfires, originally, were fires in which bones were burned,
evil-smelling affairs that were nothing like the celebratory fires of
today. Nothing liked brings nothing liked.

Please
tell Ashcroft, once he's back to full health, making his disgusting,
fascistic overtures in full force, that I burned the communication I
opened last week; it would be too easy for him to draw a line between this
article, my recent piece "AH!" ARSONISTS FOR HAITI" (which appeared on
www.counterpunch.org
and www.dissidentvoice.org),
the coming catastrophes and (alleged) advocacy on my part. That's if he
asks. I want no part of an investigation into the coming Kikuyu-like
catastrophe that we're bringing on to ourselves.

Yes, I've
got nothing more to say to the Justice Department or the American people
regarding the above. After all, it IS the American people who are
responsible for what's taking place --as per legal precedent established
at Nuremberg by us-- and they will have nothing to complain about once the
fan starts blowing, hurtling unwanted waste and more their way.

"Will all
great Neptune's oceans wash this blood, clean from my hands?", asked
Macbeth. Today, yes. The day after tomorrow, maybe not.

Finally,
it would behoove us to give some thought to these additional (personal,
emailed) words of Thomas C. Mountain (quoted also above), perhaps relating
them to this article's opening quote from L. Frank Baum,

"You might want to
consider just how bad for black folk "integration" or rather assimilation
has turned out. Before integration/assimilation black folk controlled the
institutions in their lives, the schools, the shops, the sports, even the
music. When their struggle began to lead the movement in the US, the move
was made to "integrate" them into white society, to take their children
out of the schools they controlled and assimilate them into white schools,
with white teachers etc. If one looks at the statistics covering the
majority of black folk, the 2/3s who did not benefit from equal
opportunity, life has gotten worse since the "civil rights movement",
since assimilation started. Infant mortality, maternal mortality, birth
weights, drop out rates/graduation rates, incarceration rates, drug
addiction rates, all the statistics show that life has gotten worse for
most black folk. In other words, if you want to break a people, break
their institutions first, than they become a crushed and broken people
easy to control and not a threat to the status quo."

Keep in
mind, if you will, that we're not just talking about dark-skinned people
here. And the parameters of hostility might easily extend to include
people wanting to protect our public lands...and many others.

Those
dangerous-sounding gents who reached me at home via the postal service
--color not clear-- claimed to be the three guys who I wrote about
recently in the Counterpunch piece cited above. I understand the points
they made about the U.S. not honoring The Universal Declaration of Human
Rights of December 9, 1948, and our ignoring subsequent related
international agreements and conventions. What I don't understand is a)
why they contacted me, b) how they were able to read my article and get
something out so quickly (a day following its appearance!), c) why they
used a box when the only contents were a letter, and d) how they got my
home address.

I have a
lot of questions.

Richard Oxman, a big fan of James
Baldwin's The Fire Next Time, can be reached at
mail@onedancesummit.org. He
has fire gear available upon request.
REFERENCES

(1) Terence Des Pres,
"Introduction" to Jean-Francois Steiner, Treblinka (New York: New
American Library, 1979), p. xi.
(2) See Frank Chalk and Kurt Jonassohn, The History and Sociology of
Genocide: Analyses and Case Studies (New Haven: Yale University Press,
1990). Also, Richard G. Hovannisian, ed., The Armenian Genocide in
Perspective (New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers, 1986). And
Robert Conquest, The Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivization and
the Terror Famine (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986),
especially chapter 16.
(3) David E. Stannard, American Holocaust: The Conquest of the New
World (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), p. 151.
(4) See Iris Chang, The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of
World War II (New York: Basic Books, 1997), pp. 99-104. Also, Haruko
Taya Cook and Theodore F. Cook, Japan at War: An Oral History (New
York: New Press, 1992), p. 39.
(5) John Pilger, The Secret War: "The U.S. War Against Iraq is well under
way" in TheMirror (December 20, 2002), as posted on ZNet (www.zmag.org/weluser.htm).
(6) Jeffrey St. Clair,
Been Brown So Long It Looked Like Green To Me: The Politics of Nature (Monroe,
Maine: Common Courage Press, 2004), p. 133.
(7) R. David Edmunds, "National Expansion from the Indian Pespective," in
Indians in American History, ed. Frederick E. Hoxie (1988), pp.
159-165.